Two former Navy SEALs died in a little hellhole called Benhgazi. Still in the employ of their country, Tyrone Woods and Glenn Doherty fought until the bloody end, while our country stood by and ignored their pleas for help.

Is this the country we have become? A country that turns its back on our warriors and leaves them to die without raising a finger to assist?

Voting is the measure of who we are as a people. Are we a country of cowards who refuse to help our fellow countrymen under fire? That’s what this election comes down to: Are we cowards or are we Americans?

I can point to any number of reasons why President Obama should be run out of town. We can talk about the economy, Fast & Furious, the threatened imposition of a new assault weapon ban or the health care abomination. But, leaving our people to die on foreign soil strikes to the fundamental core of our being.

At no time in my life have I ever been ashamed of my country. Yes, we have made mistakes. Sometimes those mistakes have been awful. But at no time have we ever gotten in bed with our enemies and knowingly left our own people to die.

But this administration seems to have gone on a bit farther than just leaving them to be killed by these filthy jihadists. It seems that our very own government took active measures to stop troops from moving in to assist Woods and Doherty.

The rage I feel when thinking what our government did, in our names, is indescribable.

Fortunately, it is not too late to correct our mistakes. It is likely you are reading this before the final presidential polls have closed in your state. If you have not done so already, get up right now and go vote.

We can disagree on whether or not open carry is a good idea, or if people with tattoos are the face of the changing gun culture. But the one thing that we all can agree on is we never leave anyone behind. Not a soldier, not a sailor, not an airman, not a Marine – no American is left behind, no American is abandoned.

President Obama has shown he does not subscribe to that basic American ethos. We need someone who does.

Men kept faith at Puson, Guadalcanal, Bastogne, Valley Forge, Khe Sanh and Bunker Hill. Each man standing with the next, not because it was easy, but because they were Americans. It was understood that they would never be abandoned.

Is it still true? Do we still believe in the values of the US Soldier’s Creed, which says “I will never accept defeat. I will never quit. I will never leave a fallen comrade.”

To the men and women who have made the ultimate sacrifice we owe a debt we can only repay by reclaiming what they gave their lives to protect. Woods and Doherty are not the first, nor will they be the last, to die in the service of these United States. The least we can do is get out and take a stand on what kind of country we will be.

We must remember the awe-inspiring words once spoken by President Lincoln during our country’s Civil War:

“…from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”